


Checkerboard

by Anonymous



Category: Fire Emblem Echoes: Mou Hitori no Eiyuu Ou | Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows of Valentia
Genre: F/M, Half-Sibling Incest, Implied Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-08
Updated: 2017-11-08
Packaged: 2019-01-19 09:28:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,051
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12407679
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: Once upon a time, there rode a dark horse, and a pale horse.





	Checkerboard

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Laylah](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Laylah/gifts).



> Although Alm is set up as a foil to Berkut in canon, reading through your prompts for Bernea and Conrad/Celica led me to consider the contrast between Berkut and Conrad instead. I hope you enjoy the result!

When Rinea was young, her mother would read her stories, ones about princes, fair and light with flaxen hair and eyes like the sea, galloping across the plains on white horses to the aid of maidens in distress. The tales were amusing enough to send the young girl’s mind off into a pleasant sleep, however Rinea never especially identified with the girls in the stories. While it was true that her parents were strict, they were certainly nothing that she needed rescue from. Her life, while regimented, was comfortable. The brave princes of the world should spend their precious time on girls less fortunate than her.

 

*

When Celica was a girl, her brother would recount the stories told to him by his mother the previous night. Although it was obvious that he omitted the scary parts more for his own sake than her’s (Celica’s eyes would light up any time that Conrad would slip up, giving mention to a ghost or the undead laying terror across a sleepy village- Why, it was only just a story, was it not?). Sometimes, there were brave princes in the tales, likely there to give the young boy a brave role model to aspire to. More often than not, the dashing lad on a white horse would save some girl who sat around in a tower moping rather than doing anything to help herself. Celica never wished for one of these princes, and she never dreamed of being one of those damsels. Even the marriage at the end of the tale left her feeling unsatisfied. What need would she have of some strange man to love, when she had such a sweet elder brother?

 

*

The horse that he rode upon was dark as death, it’s nature as a horse obscured to the point of being nearly conjecture, clad head to hoof in armor as the poor creature was. Rinea could call having first seen it in the palace stable on the way out of the Emperor’s ball. It had seemed an ordinary beast then, glossy and well-groomed, yet average of size and mild of temperament. Yet now, as it rode up upon the manor, Berkut seated straight as a rod atop it, the horse seemed larger than life, regal, a born leader of armies, much the same as its rider, dark hair stark and unmistakable against the softly falling snow.

As she stepped away from the window in order to go out and greet her suitor, Rinea thought that Berkut looked very much different from the princes in her girlhood books. This pleased her in a way that she didn’t quite understand, heart leaping as she hurried out to meet him.

 *

The horse that the masked man had rode in upon was white as a wedding veil, it’s armor gleaming so much as to nearly outshine that of the man astride it.

Celica had nearly thought that he might he have been an illusion cast by the cantor, conjured up to distract her. Brave people- heroes- came in the form of rouges and mercenaries, clerics and besotted archers. Real people weren’t characters from story books, they held flaws which were often times strengths in disguise. Yet here he was, a shining knight on a white horse, come to save her time and again.

While she had thought the stories to be silly as a girl, now that such a man held her in his strong arms, her heart leapt.

*

Berkut was only human, after all. If this was but one of the fairytales that Rinea had murmured to him while stroking his hair on the bench in her garden, the hero would not have faltered so terrifically.

“Forgive me for saying this, but you act as if your pride aches more than your arm does, My Lord.”

Berkut’s grimace only deepened, the truth in Rinea’s words stinging nearly as much as both the gash on his arm and his wounded pride combined.

He had been forced to retreat, bested by Alm and his men. Only adding insult to injury, as it were, the wound on his arm wasn’t even caused by Alm himself, but one of the women, a pegasus knight, the one with her hair frivolously pulled into pigtails. Even one glance at her had told Berkut everything he had needed to know- that she was but a commoner.

Berkut picked at the bandage wrapped round the majority of his arm, longing to rip it off to toss into the fireplace. However, he knew that such an action would frighten Rinea. So many times had her lovely eyes grown wide due to his temper. Once she became his empress, Berkut would make certain that she would fear for nothing. Of course, that day could never arrive so long as that Alm and his merry band of commoners stood in his way, all playing pretend like children on holiday. They understood nothing of fear.

“ _Damnit…”_ he hissed, unable to completely avoid venting his frustrations, a boiling kettle letting free the first puff of steam lest it burst.

“My Lord, you’re going to hurt yourself!” Rinea rushed to his side. Berkut hadn’t realised that his plucking at the bandages had turned into tightly gripping at the wounded area, the wrappings now spotting red. Rinea placed a concerned hand over top of his.

Berkut heaved a sigh, allowing his head to fall back as he closed his eyes in a futile attempt to quell the tempest in his gut.

As he did so, Berkut began to feel a sensation of warmth concentrated on the area surrounding his wound.

Opening his eyes, he was startled to see a glowing blue light emanating from Rinea’s fingertips.

“Rinea?”

“My Lord,” Rinea implored. “Not that I distrust you, but I beg of you not to tell my father about this gift. He thinks that women with magical ability are but a step away from becoming witches…”

Expression finally softening, Berkut laid a hand overtop Rinea’s. “This is an extraordinary gift you have been blessed with. I shall not tell a soul, you have my word.”

“Thank you.” Rinea’s smile alone surely would have been enough to numb his pain, even without the aid of magic, Berkut thought.

 

*

Conrad was only human, after all.

Even with the aid of his mask, there were still times on the battle field in which he still felt like a scared little boy, desperately scanning the fallen bodies and clashing steal for his younger sister, desperate for her protection as much as he told himself that she was in need of his.

Taking his eyes off the enemy had cost him in the form of an arrow grazing his arm, although the enemy archer paid dearly by the time the battle was through. Conrad had always felt weak at the sight of blood, but the masked knight didn’t.

“Brother!” Celica cried, sheathing her blade and hurrying toward him. “You’re hurt!”

“Anthiese!”

 _Conrad_ was a good older brother.

The masked knight felt weak at the sight of the Princess Anthiese.

Her touch on his arm- even before the magic began to flow- was gentle enough to ease the pain all on its own, the warmth of her hand as soothing as the light in her worried eyes that served as the proof that she had lived to see herself another step closer on her quest.

 

*

It was to be an early celebration for a victory that was certain, Rinea reminded herself, although her mind was hard to hear over the pounding of her heart as she shed first her shawl, before moving shaking fingers to begin work on unfastening her corset. Although it would have been unwise to risk a child before marriage, there were other ways.

“Allow me to aid you.” It came less as an offer, and more a command, although Rinea was comforted to find that his own hands- never yielding whilst on the hilt of a sword- were fumbling as well. “Duma knows, you do enough for me already.”

“Nonsense, My Lord.” She wondered if Berkut could hear her intake of breath as the ribbon on her blouse came undone, exposing her neck to the cool night air, snaking in between gaps in the castle walls. “I only wish that I could do more for you…”

They were to be married, Rinea thought as buttons slid through holes, one by one. Perhaps her formality was misplaced at this point, although he had never told her otherwise.

“I should rather be run through myself than see the need arise for you to take up the blade, Rinea.” The front of her blouse was open to where the end tucked into her skirts now. She thought that he may have been hesitant to proceed, hiding behind the guise of conversation. For so charming a man, Rinea wished that he too hadn’t need of a sword.

Although, riding into battle had been far from her meaning. Her true wish was such that she alone might be enough to ease Berkut’s heart, the promise of an empire no longer holding such an iron grip in his chest.

It was selfish of her.

“Please continue, My Lord,” Rinea nodded her encouragement, face pink as if having just come in from the cold, as she allowed herself to be guided backward into the silken sheets, too thin for a night so crisp.

Rinea’s cheek turned into the pillow, avoiding Berkut’s face as her blouse fell aside. Not even the servant who helped her to dress most mornings had seen her quite like this.

“To think that someone so lovely will soon be my queen…” Berkut’s voice was soft with wonder as he spoke, as if while victory over an entire army was a certainty, the prospect of making love to someone such as Rinea was something that should have been relegated strictly to the realm of dreams.

His kisses fell upon her collarbone, and while the sensation should have been foreign, the young lovers having kissed nowhere save for the lips thus far, however the touch felt familiar, as though half-remembered from dreams or some life long passed, Rinea did not know. What she did know for certain, was that she desired for more of it, as her skirts were cast to the floor, laying herself bare to shared victory.

 

*

 

_“Anthiese…”_

The sound of her true name made Celica squirm more than the cautious hands ghosting her over her exposed breasts. Hearing it spoken made it all the more harder to forget that the man who’s mask grazed her cheek, peppering kisses down her jawline, was in truth her older brother.

She wondered if the same would hold true for him- Was ‘ _Celica_ ’ the sister of the Masked Knight as well, or was she merely a strange maiden in distress that he had chanced upon?

She wanted to know.

“Conrad…?”

The man raised his head, lips turning into a frown. “Is everything alright? We could- I could stop…”

 _Ah._ That wasn’t what she wanted at all.

Celica shook her head. What she wanted was the Masked Knight to return, rather than brotherly concern.

“All’s well, Good Sir.” Celica smiled, hoping to set him back at ease.

They hadn’t shared a tent at the start, however the constant set up and break down of so many tents as the army moved from site to site wore old. As it was, Leon had already taken to sharing with Valbar, and Genny had been seen so often scurrying in and out of Saber’s tent, that a pair of siblings bunking together after a long separation, desperate to catch up, didn’t seem odd in the least- or so both Celica and Conrad hoped as one thing had led to another, like the tides of war, the ebb and flow of battle, one into another. Just the same as lips drifted from neck to pale breast, earning a sigh.

It would have been unwise to risk a child, given their relation, however there were other ways to reclaim their old bond, while forging one anew.

For brief moment, Celica tried to guess at Conrad’s expression underneath the mask, his handsome face dyed pink as she fumbled at his breeches, however she banished the thought. His body told her everything that she needed to know.

 

 


End file.
